Electrical apparatuses for transcutaneous, i.e., through the skin, control of muscles and nerves in the human body are generally well known. Such apparatuses are commonly used on striated muscle to treat tissue injury or to control pain. For treatment, injured striated muscles are electrically stimulated to maintain tone, size, and strength. Electrical stimulation can also be used to promote the healing of injured tissue by facilitating the transport of nutrients and release toxins. Pain control is obtained by stimulating the nerve to block out pain.
For muscle injury healing, many types of apparatuses are available. Power muscle apparatuses to maintain striated muscle tone and strength are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,976,264, 4,996,987, and 5,048,522 to Petrofsky. U.S. Pat. No. 5,097,833 to Campos teaches further refinements of the technique by using variations of the pulse forms.
Similar techniques have been disclosed for pain relief: U.S. Pat. No. 4,989,605 to Rossen reverses electrical polarity for pain relief, U.S. Pat. No. 4,938,223 to Charters (1990) varies amplitude to make the treatment more tolerable.
Tissue healing is another application of this technology. U.S. Pat. No. 4,993,413 to McLeod (1991) induces an electrical voltage in tissue specifically bone, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,895,154 to Bartelt (1990) teaches voltage inducement in soft tissue.
The teachings of these prior art devices and methods can be generally summarized as follows. They are generally applied on striated, skeletal, muscle and not smooth muscle. Further, they are used essentially to stimulate or increase activity and tone and not to inhibit or decrease activity and tone since relatively short electrical pulses are used, regardless of the variations in pattern, which tend to stimulate muscle activity. The transcutaneous nerve stimulator, TENS, that stimulate nerves to increase the pain threshold also use relatively short electrical pulses. Again their main focus is not smooth muscle but nerves. Finally, the prior art devices and methods utilize a constant voltage devices even through any effect is dependant on the various tissue resistances encountered.